Tamil people take pride in naming Murugan a Tamil Kadavul. Their love for this particular deity is high and he is the most worshiped god in Tamil Nadu. His popularity is very high in south unlike north. The concept of Murugan as Tamil Kadavul is even expressed in latest film Billa in ‘Seval Kodi’ song.

Now let us make a small survey of names used to denote Murugan,

Kandha (dervative of Sanskrit word Skanda)

Subramaniyan(Sanskrit form Subhramanya)

Saravana(One who is born in Sara Vana, where Vana means forest)

Kumaran(which means younger one in Sanskrit)

Shanmuha (one with six faces in Sanskrit)

Karthikeya (also Sanskrit orgin)

As you see all the names is either Sanskrit or Sanskrit derivatives.

Let us now see his orgin, He is son of Shiva, Parvathi and brother of Ganesha.

So what are the elements which make him a real Tamil Kadavul?

What is the Myth as we know?

The basic Myth we know is as follows :

Shiva created Murugan to kill Curan.

He was born as six children and later integrated into one.

He arrested Brahma and taught Veda to Shiva in Swamimalai.

He fought for Gyana Palam and became an Aandi(saint) and stood on Palani hills.

He received his Vel from Parvathi in Sirakali

He destroyed Curan in Thiruchentur.

He freed the Devas and in turn got married to Indra’s Daughter Theivanai in Thiruthani. Fell in love and married Valli in Palamudhirsolai

Settled in Thriparankundram as Deity with two wives.

This myth is standard myth known to all Tamilians and explains the concept of Arupadai vedu(Concept of six sacred houses/Temples).

How does it differ from Northern Myth?

The Atharva Veda describes Kumaran as ‘Agnibhuh’ or son of Agni, the fire god.

The Satapatha Brahmana refers to him as the son of Rudra and the ninth form of Agni. Unbarable to bear handle the heat , the sisu was split into six and put in the Pond in Sara Vana (Saravana Poigai).

He is brought up as six children and later in fight with Indra he was combined as one person with six heads.

He lead the army of Gods(Devas) to defeat Taraka.

He is an eternal Bachelor or he is married to Devasena, which means army of gods.

His weapon was raging fire , since he was a form of Agni.

He is eternally young god

He has attributes of attributes of being a teacher (The Chandogya Upanishad refers to Skanda as the “way that leads to wisdom”)

Myth of Skanda arresting Brahma also comes up.

Some important points to be noted here are:

Skanda is not son of Shiva.

He has no mother.

He is an eternal bachelor.

He doesn’t have a weapon called Vel.

There is no mention of Valli.

What was the Early Tamil myth?

There is no structured myth in Tamil for Murugan, but from various Sangam sources and archeological evidence and by inference, Murugan had the following features and attributes:

Eternal youth and beauty

Prowess in hunt and fighting

Prowess in love making (like Kama in Sanskrit)

Ability to enter and possess human beings

Red colour

Vel as his main weapon

Connection with animals like peacock, cock ,elephant and possibly goat and snake

Slayer of enemy cur ,representing fear ,terror and anxiety

Love for and union with Valli

Son of Mother goddess Korravai.

So here you see Murugan has a mother and not a bachelor. He has lover Vali, the daughter of mountain chief with whom he makes sexual union. He is also god of love and victory.

How was he worshiped in Early Tamilnadu?

He was believed to posses Katampu tree , hence the name Kadamban

He also possessed young women.

His priest was known as Velan.

Murugan was believed to posses Velan and give blessings to people.

He was worshiped by a form of Dance called Veriyatu.

He was also god of mountainous region Kurunji.

He was worshiped as slayer of evil and terror Cur, which later became Curan.

He was also believed to be god of Love, and often quoted in Sangam literature for his interludes with Valli.

The Integration:

Integration of Dravidian Murugan and Aryan Skanda has taken place when Pallavas came to Tamil Nadu. The Brahmins have spearheaded this integration.

Some important points in the integrated form:

The similar traits of both gods are eternal youth and destruction of evil.

The Aryan god had a father but no mother and Dravidian god has mother but no father.

The Dravidian mother Korravai was identified with Kali, Durga or Amman as early as Sangam age.

Since Kali /Durga were identified with Parvati the consort of Shiva, Murugan was identified as son of Shiva.

Taraka the asura in Aryan version was made brother of Surapadman(later name of Cur,Curan)

The eternal bachelor who was married to Devasena(Army of god) was changed to God with two wife to accommodate Valli, which was very famous tradition among Tamil .

Devasena was comfortably converted to Theivanai(Devayanai- Tamil myth says she was brought up by Ayiravatham the elephant of Indra – hence Deva yanai instead of Deva Sena or Deva Senai) a Brahmin girl and daughter of Indra.

The myth also was made up to represent two kind of marriage, Kalavu – love marriage (a Tamil/Dravidian tradition- Valli and Murugan) and Karpu – arranged marriage (Brahmin tradition- Theivanai and Murugan).

The fire weapon of North was replaced with Vel which is South Indian tradition.

Murugan as a mountain god is still maintained with all his temples situated on or near mountains.

When does the current myth come into Tamil Nadu?

The first textual evidence of Murugan as on of Shiva appears in Silapadikaram(4th Century AD).

The whole myth was first explained in Thirumurgatrupadai by Nakkirar(7-9th Century AD)

Final form of myth we know was written by Kasiappa Civasariyar in Kanthapuranam(14th Century AD)

Even in Kanthapuranam , Palani was not mentioned and surrounding myth of Gyana Palam was not included.

The standard Myth we know about Murugan was only written in 14 th century by Kasiappa Civacariyar a Brahmin priest at Kanchipuram.

How did the myth enter North India?

The myth of Muruga as we know was first written in Sanksirt sources in Sivapurana.

Sivapuranas were composed around 9-10th Century AD by Sanskrit scholars of south and it was heavily influenced by the Bakthi movement prevalent in south.

Unlike south, the North Indian myth says that Karthikeya was elder to Ganesha.

The popularity of Karthikeya is also not much in North India.

This is very brief essay to outline the process of Skanda – Muruga integration. There some evidences which has come up recently to indicate Murugan might be Pre Historic god and an inherited God of Tamil people rather than an indigenous deity. My next essay would be on his Pre Historic origins.

I have not read in detail about it , but have heard about it. I cannot speculate on it. They Usually say Thircendur is permual kovil because its near sea…. and Thirupathi is Murugan koil because its on mountain. But we have very very early record that Thirucendur is a sacred place for Murugan (as early as 1BC to 1 AD). So Thirucendur is surely not a perumal koil as speculated.
But I have not read any thing about Thirupathi as of now….but there is a literature available…If I read it I can form an opinion about it. As of now my opinion is …it might be just a speculation.
SIlapadigaram says Thiruvenkadam is Perumal Koil.Silapadigaram is 4th century AD. So any early lit should be reviewed.

Appreciate the good work…
However rig veda is not the only sanskrit literature on muruga that can lead to think that the aryans did not regard him as the son of shiva… Kalidasa’s ‘kumara sambhavam’ which dates back to period before nakkeerar describes the birth of muruga, from drops of rudra’s semen, which were burning like raging fire and cooled on reaching the holy waters.
He is the son of shiva – parvati, but not born of parvati’s womb , instead only out of shiva….
Continuing on those lines, even ganesha was given life only through parvati and did not involve shiva… but that cannot lead us to think that he is not the son of shiva. Traditionally, it is believed that, those born out of womb are subject to the cycle of birth and death and hence gods aren’t born that way!
Yes, the legend of valli is something specific to dravidian traditions…

@ second and third comment-
I have not heard/read anything about any controversy on thiruchendur. However the controversy on tirupati is more deep rooted and can’t be attributed merely to it’s location on a hill.
Some facts-
1. On the four corners of the main sanctum, one sees lions facing upwards and guarding, which is not a feature of vaishnavaite traditions.
2. The shanka and chakra look as though standing on two separate rivets, which could have easily been attached to an existing idol. This is not the case generally with other idols like varadaraja of kanchipuram or shri vaikuntam.
3. Also, this could be likely, as the two hands attached to the idol also do not hold a lotus or a club (which is the general norm) and instead surprisingly one finds a ‘dhandam’ (a stick) besides it.
Muruga is just one of the options presented by the fathers of this theory. There is an equal likeliness of it being a shakti temple or even of some jain (samana madham) god, considering the religiously charged atmosphere during those times, and how one tradition tried to superimpose the other… I have also come across some surprising references about tirupati in relatively recent sanskrit literature (16-17 AD), which seem to affirm such controversies…

Wow every article were really interesting.Hey one more to add… I have see people saying that all Murugan temples will be in hills and Vishnu temple are not as it is said to highlight the Thirupathi issue… I know one Lakshmi Narasimham temple in sholingar which is on a small hill, but really dont know how old it is..

Also I read about Ramayana and Mahabaratha in some website as a story of a real king who lived 3000BC and 1900BC respectively and not the GOD myth as we all know by. I will try to post the web address of the article.

1. Murugan was not married to Devasena. Devasenapati means lord of devar senai (i.e he was army general of devas). It doesnt mean he married an army!!!

2. Indra gifted him his elephant airavatham (source for change of name from devasena to deivayaanai in tamil)

3. You say that “The first textual evidence of Murugan as on of Shiva appears in Silapadikaram(4th Century AD)” and also “The myth of Muruga as we know was first written in Sanksirt sources in Sivapurana”. However Kalidasa the poet who lived between sometime during 2nd-3rd century AD, has written a big work called KumaaraSambhavam (“birth of Kumaran”) as child of Siva and Parvati. Kumaarasambhavam is a very famous book. How did you miss this?

4. The aarupadaiveedu in TN (“six army houses” or “six barracks”) belonging to him, confirms his role as army general of devas.

5. You say “His priest was known as Velan”. This is wrong. Velan means “he who has the Vel aayudham”.

6. You say that “There is no mention of Valli”. Valli will not be mentioned in early literature since this story of marriage with valli is traceable only to TN. Valli was supposed to be a hill tribal girl or kurathi from TN (Western Ghats region).

1.If you see sanskrit literature …which i am sure you have not gone through…the original sanskrit Skanda purana….Skanda is married to Devasena. But other epics(skanda purana is not the only source of this epic…there are various different versions in ramayana ….mahabratha) so early Sanskrit literature …he was either married to women Deva sena or a bachelor in literal sense married to Deva sena(the army of god)
I can quote 4 books for your reference….three as in my article on more book which extensively surveys sanskrit literature….
The many faces of Murukan_ : the history and meaning of a South Indian god / Clothey, Fred W.
2. Again you are wrong…… the myth is Deviyanai and Valli were daughters of Thirumal on previous birth, Deviyani is born as daughter of Indra in this birth and brought up by Airavatham his elephant hence the name deviyanai
3.Yes what I have said is right…KumaraShambava is about the myth of Kumara or Skanda…who then had no correlation with Murugan who was sung by Tamil poets….Hence Silapadikaram was the first literature to have Muruga(After integration with Skanda) as son of Shiva….Again sanskrit sources with the myth we know as of now Valli,Devasena ,Murugan,Surapadman and tharaka was only written in sivapuranas during 10th century
4.Arupadai veedu is a concept of very very late orgin, probably after 15th century….till 9th century there is no shrine with statue of Murugan with Valli or Deviyanai…he is always alone as statue….only one statue ofPallava temple has Murgan with only one bride….and there is a conflict whether it is valli or Deviyanai…in sangam literature except for Thirucentur and Thiruparankundram , there is no mention of any other temples as Murugans sacred places….even in Kandapuram of Kasiappa Ciasariyar there is no mention of Palani. So taking Arupadaiveedu as proof is not valid.
5.This clearly show u have never heard about Snagam literature…See my blog on love sickness….I have quoted around 4 poems which clearly show Velan was the priest of Murugan and not Murugan himself…..
6.Again you are wrong, Valli can be traced in Srilankan religions…not the Tamils in Srilanka but the Sinhalese in Srilanka. Sinhalese have a god Kathirgama who is identified with Muruga and Similarly a tribe gal is in love with Kathirgama and marries him. This shows that the myth of Murugan and Valli was famous very long ago and as early as 4 or 3 BC.Since Sinhalese are Aryans who travelled from north to Srilanka around 5th BC.

@Palaniappan Vairam
You have to get your facts right on kumara sambhavam… it is an epic that i filled with loads of references to the demons skanda slayed, the cause for his incarnation, etc. It is absurd to argue that he is different from the deity sung by tamil poets

First people who quote Kumara Sambhava should be aware that only first 8 Cantos of it was written by Kalidasa and last eight, most scholars agree is later work by some other person
The first eight cantos contain only till parvati and shiva make love play….Skanda is not yet born….
V Ragavan dates the last 8 Cantos be written only in 6th century….
And as far as Kalidas is dated some where between 3 AD to 4th century….
Sangam is dated between 1BC to 3 AD….
Kumara sambhava is later work compared to most of Sangam literature….
And by all means if any person has read sangam literature….he would surely accept that Description of murgan is no way similar to descriptions of Skanda in northern Literature….
There are so many literatures specific to Murugan as in Sangam literature….if any one is really interested….I can mail you the books….

Yes, he is correct, his analysis is also correct. While coming from north to south Aryans unable to invade in to south. South was having strongly with Murugan in hills , Amman, and pillaiyaar in plains. So the brahmins who came for aiyar boojari business, they were unable to enter into Tamilnadu. They divided and created languages mixing sanskrit. Thats how telugu , Kannada created. Latest is Malayalam. Only place they were unable to enter into was the large Tamil areas. They used this trick. Lord muruga is the younger son of Shiva (Hindu equivalent of Karthikeya), Pillaiyaar is the elder son of shiva (Hindu equivalent of ganesha). They told Muruga is having two wifes , equivalling to our Valli and Deivanai. Pillaiyaar is unmarried. But in north it is different , Karthikeya is elder, unmarried, no unmarried girl will worship karthikeya. ganesha younger, having two wives!!!. Aryans defrauded Tamils. Lord murugan is not son of shiva, not karthikeya, not killed any sooran or anybody, Lord pillaiyaar is not son of Shiva, norhing to do with Lord murugan , not brother of lord murugan. He is not Lord ganesha. Amman is not Shakthi or wife of Shiva. Look to your grand father names ,All our original names are tamil, when we enter in to temples they gave us sanskrit names. In the temple business battle tamils, we lost our originality, god and everything. we donot have even a single holiday for our god muruga’s festival. All we celebrate are the festivals who have cheated us……

They were unable to defeat tamils, so they called tamils as arakkans. Soorapanman , ravanan,narakasuran all are tamil kings who ruled this state. Just because they were unable to enter their gods into this state they made all gimmicks. Now we worship the people who defeated us. But actually who tried to protect us we are calling them as arakkans. Tamils ruled ceylon and yes ravana was defeated by ram. The vanara padai (monkeys army) they noted were north indians . Thats how the sanskrit based sinhalese linguistic people entered into ceylon.

English and aryans are having similarities. From middle asia because of natural calamities aryans shifted towards east, Europeans moved towards west and remaining arabians. Maththiya asiavil irunthu mani adikka vanthavarkale aiyarkal.All over the world light skinned people ruled dark skinned people, as per english theory. ( http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/ancient/aryan/aryan_frawley_1.html )

Indus valley civilisation belonged to Dravidians and just of not knowing horse, iron etc., dravidians were defeated by aryans. Aryans pushed dravidians towards south. ( http://adaniel.tripod.com/aryans.htm ). Indus valley people worshipped nature. Still Tamils worship nature praising festivals only. Our Pongal, Aadi perukku are some of the examples for nature worship. We , Tamils not having any festival which celebrates others death. But unfortunately to celebrate death (Narakasuras death) we are having a holiday but aadi perukku we are not having any holiday.

We speak all teh time about Thamil kadavul Murugan, we do not have even a single holiday for our lord.

We should have. We have to find our one best day for Lord Murugan, Lord Pillaiyaar and Lord Amman. Let us find out a day and have a holiday different from north Indians.

We all belongs to Tamil Religion where our gods are Murugan, Pillaiyaar, Amman, Ayyanar, Karupparayan, kannimaar, Annamaar etc.,.
These gods are nothing do to with north indian gods.

There exists a third story, which is as per all believable evidence the real one.

‘Vedic Hinduism’ has a History of assimilating local deities like Virumandi, Maduraiveerasamy, Sudalaimadasami, etc.

Murugan, apparently, is one such village chieftain who was later ‘deified’, meaning made into a god.

The EXACT story matches with the deity Kande Yakka, who was the village chieftain of Kataragama, more popularly known as Kadirgamam, in SL.

Murugan/Kande Yakka were valiant chieftains who later married a local tribal girl called Valli. Vallimalai in Vellor District provides very good evidence of this.

Virumandi in Theni district is worshipped as Viruman or Brahman. Maduraiveerasamy is another example, Kallazhagar is again a local chieftain…………most famously Ayyappan.

Ayyappan is STILL worshipped by some tribal communities in Kerala, who wear white-and-white and NOT Kavi, they worship him as Kaval dheiyvam and do not believe in the Siva-Vishnu son baloney.

My point is, both of these versions presented are to be appreciated, however based on Pagan folklore and the rest, the pieces do not fit. Murugan/Kande Yakka was indeed a village chieftsain who was later assimilated. The rest of the Shanmughan, etc……….were foisted on this new found man, whose name might not even be Murugan.

List of chieftains, in accordance with Tamil beliefs of honoring their dead, which were hijacked by Vedic Hinduism:

Murugan became Siva’s son
Thirumal became Srinivasan
Virumandi became Brahman
Maduraiveeran became Vishnu (some versions)
Sudalaimadasamy became Sivan
Ayyappan became the son of Siva-Vishnu (total BS)
Chinna/Periya Karuppannan became Jayan/Vijayan
Kallazhagar/Azhagar became Vishnu

With the help of brahmin poojaris Shiva , Vishnu and like Branhmin gods entered into temples of cities first. They have changed the Tamil temples into Brahmin temples. Tamil gods kept aside. Then it would have taken long time to enter into villages. First in cities they have changed the Tamil names in to sanskrit names as the naming ceremony takes place mostly in temples. The Tamils who left long long ago are worshipping lord muruka, Pillaiyaar, Amman etc and not worshipping gods with stories like shiva, vishnu etc. This is evident from Tamils in Malaysia , Singapore, Indonesia, Burma,Mauritious,south Africa etc.,. Because those who left from villages were not knowing about shiva, vishnu etc.,. slowly slowly we were converted into Aryans Hinduism. But to whatever level you convert into Aryan Hinduism they will not accept you as brahmins. This conversion process you can see this in your own eyes. When a Hindu convert into Christianity in the beginning they worship Some hindu gods also, they will be having some attachment to hinduism. In the change process second generation and furthergeneration people will be viewed differently by orginal christian . We are living in shadow, we donot know our own values and we are with austirity following hindu gods other than original tamil gods. As we are not worshipping our tamil gods we can say Tamils were converted in to hinduism just like how people are converted in to christianity or Islam.

change of a man in to God is very clear from this :
MGR is made as god. Mahatma Gandhi is a God. What about Kushboo?. We worship best performers. All these are having temples in Tamilnadu. Assume there is no communication and technology then after 500 years, All these people will be God List. That’s why christianity and Islam restricted number of Gods.

Aurobindo Ghosh, who was a freedom fighter and a ‘terrorist’ during the British times fled British India and came to French Pondicherry and later got engrossed in spiritualism. Mother Mira Alfassa was similar, except that she was Polish.

To try to know about Murugan from discussions about his “dravidian/aryan” origin would be pointless. since the aryan invasion theory is itself disputable, it makes no logical sense to ascertain the “ethnicity” of murugan…

like many other myths, the versions differ according to region..
yet the tamil kanda puranam is a portion of the skanda purana..said that Murugan himself had revealed to kachiappar (16 century BCE) the portion of His history…

Murugan, whether as the tribal hill god, or the vedic Skanda, or the consort of Valli, is One and One only…

It is ridiculous to think of wheter the god i worship is a “pure tamil god” or some aryan import..i dun believe in racism even towards man, what about gods? if really the present murugan is declared as an “aryan”, how will it matter to a devotee?

Such discussions are really of no religious value whatsoever…it is really a stage for reviving the old ” i hate aryan campaign, which is outdated, irrelevant to modern life and nothing more that bigotry int the guise ethnic pride.

I would like to make certain clarifications,
1.I accept Aryan invasion theory is not true, that actually means the people of Indus valley were not chased away by the aryans, but rather they had insufficient resources in Indus valley hence they relocated.
2. The whole essay speaks of Aryan and Dravidian as a language group and not as an ethinic group. So the essay speaks about the Tamil elements and the Sanskiritic elements in simple terms.
3. Any person who has interest in sangam literature would go into this discussion since Murugan in Tamil sangam literature is totally different from what we know of him today
4. This is just history and analysis of written records, I am not questioning the faith of any devotee.
5. This essay truly dosent has any relegious value, rather it looks into roots of beliefs and history behind various myths.
6. All over my blog I treat Aryan and Dravidian as language groups. There is also one more language group in India namely Munda.

And one small correction too…in Kandapuranam by Kasiappa Sivacariyar, he himself in chapter confessed that he has know many myths of Muruga and he has writtena myth which he believes to be correct. He also mentions he writes the verses and keeps it before the lord every night and next morning his verses were corrected of mistakes by the lord.
Kirupanantha Variyar has commented that Kasiapacivasariyar has used a legend which could best describe the philosophy of Saiva Siddhantha.
I have a critical analysis of Kandapuranam of Kasiappa Civasariyar with me. If you wish to read I can pass it on to you.

Aryans came from outside India just like Christians and Muslims. Most of the historians accepted the fact that aryans came from outside india.

Aryans are different from Dravidians and they are not in the same linguistic group also. White Aryans belongs to European linguistic group and Black Dravidians belongs to indo dravidian linguistic group. Both are from different race.

We cannot accept all such stories just like that. No devotee accept muruka as son of shiva if he read pre sangam literatures. We believe only in Muruka, Pillaiyaar and amman who are not aryan gods.

You read tamil literatures one by one from the past in chronological order then you will come to know when tamil was sanskritised and aryan gods were pushed into tamilnadu.

Kudos to Palaniappan Vairam in his efforts to identify our ethnic group in a better way.

The greatness, as well as the problem in India/Hinduism, is that we have been open and influenced by various doctrines/myths/influences both internally. Its completely ok in India to believe in a married Murugan or a bachelor.. as son of Siva or not.. as a small village hero who was deified or a true son of god. Whereas, look at the reaction to Dan Brown’s theory that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene!

The whole confluence of Aryans/Dravidians, what ideas were Aryan vs Dravidian, who influenced whom is complex. In addition, there is still a lot of speculation around Mayan/Persian invasion of North India. I read that Aryans never had any god other than nature (similar to Greek thought) and absorbed Rudra/Siva, Sakthi worship from Dravidians.

Murugan is my favourite God and I was looking for English articles about him when I came across this enlightening and interesting article. The discussions were an eyeopener too. Looking forward to your next article.
Tks
Thila

All gods which are not having a relationship to tamil are having one holidays. But our motherly god murugan is not having even a single holiday. Let our politicians understand our feelings and give atleast thaipoosam as a holiday.

I wish to ask Vairam one question :

In Murugan how the letter G came instead of K? (I feel it should be murukan).

Murgan means beauty,sweetness etc. where as Murukan means deadly terrror etc.
When the aryans settled south they brought in their conception of God should be beautiful and devils hould be ugly…
hence there seems to be a change of K to G….

See u cant just take a word out and say tamil is older or sanskrit is older so its tamil/sanskrit word… a word is believed to be of one language group based on etymology…
skanda clearly has etymology meaning…something that is ‘oozing out’…in sanskrit… but Tamil Kandha has no etmology meaning except it has been adopted from a sanskrit word

For Etmology of Murugan you can read my History of Murugan post. It has detailed explanation by world renowned scholar Irvatham Mahadevan.
Centi is Tamil orgin word typically used to address Thirucenthur in Sangam Literature.

Hi!Nice article…
Now I’m more confused…More and more I research bout hinduism,more and more I get confused.Is aryan dravidian theory true or not,I’ve seen in a website that hinduism is not a religion.It was made into a religion by the british in which they included all gods except budhist,christian and muslim gods and again I hear here that tamil gods and north indian gods r different.Which is true and which isn’t can some one clarify???

Lets take up each issue one by one
1. The theory that was proved wrong was Aryan Invasion theory..i.e. Aryans did not invade and win over Dravidian and established a culture which solely represents aryan philosophy. Aryans were settlers in Indus Valley and due to over exploitation of the valley people moved south from Gujrat ,Saurastra towards Deccan. There is no pure Aryan culture as quoted by scholars in prev century as scholars now have proved there are 1000’s of words of Dravidian origin even in Rig Veda. Similarly Dravidian languages have influence of Sanskrit ,Pakrit and Pali. This is a well established fact.
2. The influence of each cultures have taken place over the centuries. But Tamil Sangam Literature is the only literature/culture which seems to have very minimal aryan influence.
3. Another confusion of yours is Aryan / Dravidan. Aryan and Dravidian are language groups not racial identity. So what ever I have mentioned here is from sources of Tamil and Sanskrit (the literary sources).The best example I can give to explain this concept is suppose a racially an Aryan who had come down to south before 500 years(say), he adapted to Tamil culture and Tamil language . After 500 years he is a Dravidian speaker and member of Dravidian culture but he is racially an Aryan. One present day example is Aishwarya rai’s mother tongue is Tulu which is a Dravidian language.
3. Hinduism term was coined by the British. But far before that the integration of the religions took place. When I mean Hinduism , I mean it as Vedic hinduism where the highest authority is Veda. There are other religions like village paganism, Jainism, Bhuddism which were very Popular in Tamil Nadu. Hinduism got popular only during the post 6th century and as Shaivism and Vaishnavism. Later Kings Like Raja Raja accepted both the gods and hence you can say the integrated Hinduism started 1000 yrs before British came.
4. The Early Tamils had different spiritual philosophies compared to that of the Vedic Hinduism. For them King was a god and to die in battle was to attain salvation. The code they followed was called Maram.
5. To explain in simple terms, there were many small operators but when the MNCs come in they take over the company, after 20 years no one remembers the small company which was there before 20 years and identify them as part of MNC. Hinduism is the biggest MNC in which so many small religions got integrated or taken over.

I liked this post. While it is considered that anything that is related to hinduism is strictly not hard core dravidian, I wanted to bring up a semi-relevant point here. Just as a lot of words were imbibed from Sanskrit to Tamil, the reverse is also true. A lot of Tamil words were also absorbed into Sanskrit. An example is the word ‘dravida’ itself. Experts agree that the sanskrit word is a derivation of thamizha->Dramida->Dravida. Just because early Tamil records have been destroyed
naturally/artificially, it is disputable that (atleast some of )the words you described were loaned from Sanskrit and not vice versa.

i am simply blown away by your work and passion. kudos vairam and thanks so much !

this thread is of particular significance to me and i hope to read all your analyses in detail as and when time permits.

As for skanda, the sanskrit word skandha means shoulder. kartikeya the general was famed for his strong and powerful shoulders – in the beginning, to handle weaponry, but soon enough, to support twelve arms and six heads .

hey while u talk about the sanskirt origin of names of murugan…….u tend to take it for granted that the names are of sanskirt origin.

Here is one that i can prove within the limits of my knowledge.

KARTHIKEYA – kArthikaiyAn.

Kar = Mazhai (tamil) or rain
Thikai = pozhuthu or time
An = suffix for a male

kaarthikai means = rainy season.

the month of karthikai in both tamil and sanskirt calender corresponds to the english months of OCTOBER roughly, when there is rain ONLY IN SOUTH INDIA (particularly Tamil nadu) due to Retreating or North east monsoon and Cyclone in Bay of Bengal.

this clearly proves Tamil origin of the name…

Similarly others might be proved by some way…

Come out of the delusion that words came from sanskrit to tamil. Infact recent analysis have shown that most of the sanskrit words can be etymologically traced to Tamil as origin…..

presence of sha, ja, ksha, sa…do not make the word of sanskrit origin….

Hi,
Good work Palaniappan Vairam, u cleared all my doubts that i had for long years. I would like to you to know whether you wrote some article about occurrence of castes in Tamil nadu. If you have written please share with me.

if u are so confident that karthigai is of sanskrit origin, could you please trace its etymology in sanskrit for me to understand how it is. i can understand some sanskrit also.

u want to tell me that the name was first given by Sanskrit astronomy scholors or is of sanskrit origin. Two are different. Many of the greatest of the sanskrit scholars….were south indians….might as well be dravidians infact.

Aryan – dravidian is, as per Max muller, not a significantly racial but a linguistic difference.
What started as racial difference finally became a linguistic difference, thanks to intermixing of the races to such great extant.

It’s not surprising to see may tamil origin words in great sanskrit texts written by many dravidian sanskrit scholars.

Astronomy in ancient india had its base in south just as Alchemy was popular in north west.

These Tamil speaking sanskrit scholars helped in introducing a lot of Tamil words into sanskrit texts. While some core words and especially the SYNTAX of writing was taken into the aryan folds from Tamil much before, might even be before Indus civilization.

Even though i accept the fact that there were different names for the tamil months before wat we have now, this does not mandete that whatever that came later were from sanskrit.

I find no reason to be convinced by your arguement. could you throw more light into the word in sanskrit.

Sanskrit in an Indo-European family of languages, can u make some connection b/w karthikai in sanskrit and latin/greek for me to borrow ur concepts.

I’ve clearly stated my idea breaking the word to pure tamil roots. and no need to relate it to any other language as tamil is the mother of a completely different and unique family of languages, unlike sanskrit which is a highly derieved language – greek, latin, Tamil, munda, tribal tongues, tibetian family, evrythng in one.

All the best. I’m tough and dont bend easily without concrete convincing arguement. Not just bunch of names, how they were called befor and now.

U said these names are still used in south east. the spread from india to SE countries took place during the later cholas, around 800-1400 AD roughly (Rara raja chola and others). these ancient names are not as ancient to be used in the arguement. before this tamils had no names for months?? why dont u research into that?

I am giving you a detailed reply on etymology of karthikeya in terms of Sanskrit.
Lets start from the base
1 kRtti – (= %{kR4ttikA}) one of the lunar mansions (the Pleiads) L. ;
Kritti –> kRttikA
66 kRttikA %{As} f. pl. (rarely sg. MBh. iii , 14464 BhP. vi , 14 , 30)N. of a constellation (the Pleiads , originally the first , but in later times the third lunar mansion , having Agni as its regent ; this constellation , containing six stars , is sometimes represented as a flame or as a kind of razor or knife ; for their oldest names see TS. iv , 4 , 5 , 1 ; in mythol. the six Kr2ittika1s are nymphs who became the nurses of the god of war , Ka1rttikeya) AV. TS. S3Br. &c. ; white spots VarBr2S. lxv , 5 Sch. ; a vehicle , cart S3Br. xiii Sch.
kRttika–>kArttika
kArttika m. (fr. %{kRttikA} q.v. ; with or without %{mAsa})N. of a month corresponding to part of October and November (the twelfth month of the year , when the full moon is near the Pleiades) Pa1n2. La1t2y. MBh. &c. ; N. of Skanda (see %{kArttikeya}) BrahmaP. ; of a Varsha ; of a medical author ; (%{as} , or %{am}) m. n. N. of the first year in Jupiter’s period of revolution VarBr2S. Su1ryas. ; (%{am}) n. N. of a Ti1rtha MatsyaP.
Keya —> means descendant
kaikeya m. (Pa1n2. 7-3 , 2) `” a descendant of Kekaya “‘
Ambikeya m. (g. %{zubhrA7di} Pa1n2. 4-1 , 123) , a descendant of Ambika1

Karthikeya means – Ka1rttikeya may be derived from his foster mothers or from the month Ka1rttika as the best for warfare: in the Mr2icch. and elsewhere he is regarded as presiding over thieves) MBh. &c. (also from lexicon)

kritti means the Pleiads –>krittika also means the same constellation –> Karttika means the month where moon is seen along with Pleiads –>karthikeya -descendent of Krittika(6 mothers) or Descendent of Karttika(month of warfare)

Kumara the sanskrit word means kid or young boy and Tamil Kumaran is derivative of the Sanskrit word as indicated by the Tamil Lexicon. Both are used to represent Lord Skanda/Muruga since he is god of youth.

typical case of touching the nose around the head.
i know well that the sanskrit “scholars” can go to any extant to cook up a story.
the vedas and purans are living example for the fact.

you again mention that karthikeya came from krittika. you are dragging into the arguement whether egg came first or chicken to confuse everyone and claim victory in that confused environment.

what i asked you to do is split the word and explain not to speak lofty mythologies.
Also pls dont copy-paste from websites to prove ur point. it does not. read, understand and then write in this page.
dont mis-inform people.

see ur previous posting – u said karthigai was called madangal
No.No. As per the site the karthigai (nov-dec) corresponds to nali.
proves that u have not read properly. wat authenticity can i expect from other postings of yours.

can you PLEASE refer to a similar word for a month in other Indo-European languages.
I bet ur “source” website will not give any. çoz it’s a tamil origin word.

the karthigai kannigal or karthikai pengal கார்த்திகைப்பெண்கள் are so called because they came in the month of karthigai and not vice-versa.

still i dont see you splitting the word into roots as i clerly did in tamil.

sit down & think for urself, if ur way of tracing into sanskrit and the reason u gave is anymore valid infront of what reasons and arguements i made accept it.

Otherwise come up with a wise arguement.

Not a copy paste from any website or nan online dictionary.

kumaran is also of tamil origin.
i’l come again with valid arguements to prove it. (not copy-pastings)
bye. all the best

If you can give one reference to your argument I will accept it.
Copy and pasting is for reference of other readers to show that it has been taken from authentic reference.
I have gone through every possible source from my side
Dravidian etymology dictionary, Sangam Literature Word usage, Tamil lexicon,Sanskrit lexicon.
Karthikkiyen is a sanskrit derivative word and I stand by it.
Please post further comments with valid reference else it will not be approved.

Kar in dravidian root never means rain. + Karthikeyan has never found usage in sangam literature + there is clear progression in sanskrit term kriti as explained in prev reply.

I can pile you up with various references. All you are replying back is” I am sure”, “I know”. If you are so sure you can go ahead and publish a paper and once it is published, I will change that Karthikeyan is Tamil word and give your paper as reference.

In my openion Murugan who married Valli and Karthikeya who married Devyani are separate.To unite the whole india they gave Murugan a second wife Devayani.Karthikeyan is worshipped only in sothern states and srilanka,but not beyond.beleiving puranas to ascertain historical facts is not correct.Puranas are written with motivation

U are again dragged in the “which came first thing?”
U comfortaly assume the common words are of sanskrit origin.
To prove any theorem, assumptions are important. if they are biased, u cant prove anything.

I hav jus copy pasted… u can refer to any sanskrit dictionary for all possible words for black in sanskrit..

Also pls check all possible words for Black in tamil.
Its only Karuppu.

So u mean to say that tamil had no word for black????
The single word is also borrowed???
There are hundreds of tamil words starting with “karu-”
karuku- to burn
kari – coal, elephant (black)

U are doing good research using dictionaries..
But u failed to notice that the dictionaries were written in a period wen there was a bias in the society that tamil words are derived from sanskrit and tamil has no scholarliness

Now, most of the words are found to be of tamil origin
The etymology will be corrected in those dictionaries…

So pls do sum research with logic..
To know wat dictionary says, v dont need u.. v can google it… v want to know wat u think…and how u prove it before us..

Its not necessary that, i shud use my brain and think and conclude only if i am a full time tamil scholar publishing research papers everyday.

Dont be Brahminical in ur concept that u shut ur thinking mind and follow the books…
Tamils always question…
Take Thirukkural… any athigaaram… Read the couplets in order…
wen u read one, u will get a question, the next couplet is the answer to it. Thiruvalluvar knew the importance of questioning in enriching knowledge. coz tamils are always rationalists.

“Dont be Brahminical in ur concept that u shut ur thinking mind and follow the books…
Tamils always question…” please be judicious in your comments…
I have placed my arguments based on source…unless and untill I get another source which disproves it I would continue on the same source (which is considered a standard in Tamil Literature)…dont be caste ist while you argue , you have no right to judge what kind of person I am.

I have referred to Dravdian etymology dictionary and found kar to be a dravidian origin. But Still that doesnt change anything in my essay.
Karthikai – argument that season of end of rain has no reference to Muruga in Sangam literature (the only literature before sanskritization fo south)…
karthikeya surely alludes to the myth of Skanda being brought up by kiritka
so the discussion of kar and kal and karthikai and kirithai can lead us various debates..still we have no legends or references to connect kar –> karthikai to Murugan in Sangam literature..
infact Murugan is addressed as seyon and sevval namely red god..and is not associated with rain…

if you want to argue further please quote me single credible evidence to show that karthiakai has any association with Muruga cult in Sangam litertaure.

Basically in all the ancient Pagan regions……the Deities are different at the same time same…..”Hindusim” is the only surviving “Pagan religion” in the world….. we must preserve it and not fight…..

Shiva was known as Dynosius in Roman mythology…. Amman (Mother Goddess) was common throughout the world…. Even know you can find mother goddess temples in all villages across India/Nepal/SL( all are “different deities”…. but they are identified with “Universal mother”)

Calling “Muruga” as “Tamil Kadavul” is ok…. also “Ganesha” is a “Marathi Kadavul” and “Kaliamman” is a “Bengali Kadavul”……”Venkateshwara” is a “Telugu kadavul” & so on…….

But please remember if “Muruga” is a “God” atleast he should be the same on “Mars” & “Earth” !… So relax and worship…. he will respond even if you are in space…!

all glories to you and your wonderfull acheivement ,it is truely amazing to see the debate you have brought about. As a vaisnavite i know little of murgan but wanted to see images. I agree whole heartedly with the last comment “god dosent care which language you worship in” he wants only your true love and addoration,thus wilst vishnu and his incarnations belong to my tradition I,none the less want to learn more about all forms and incarnations .The arian,dravidan influences on the deity are facinating , historicaly and culturaly important they should not be dissregarded,however there is a ballance to be acheived , language is by its very nature constantly changing .as the lord buddha advised his deciples “look not at the word ,but at the meaning” this appears in the pali texts but not so literaly quoted in the vaisnava canon . we are however truely fortunate in the respect that we can cross reference so many texts,thus we broaden our understanding .Yet we must not loose sight nor reason ,all forms eminate from the supreme and from all forms we may come to know the supreme. words are but tools and can only express the understanding of the narator,and then are only truely understood by those who are pure of mind.
I will be back to read more , thank you and
god bless.

Infact the son should be older than the Father, this is my current belief about Murugan and Siva.

Murugan is a deivam natural force he was later adapted as Avalokoteswara during the buddhist period,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skanda_%28Buddhism%29
This is when he climbed on hilltop and became aandi and people started putting mottai going to his hills.

Later in the Bhakthi period he became Siva’s son and got the Gyaana palam.

The name of the person who wrote “Kandha Puranam” in Tamil is KACHCHIYAPPA Sivachariar who translated the “Skanda Puranam” written in Sanskrit by Sri Vidyaranya, the founder of the Vijayanagar Empire & it was Vidyaranya who chose the Kuruba boys Harihara & Bukka to head the Vijayanagar Empire. BTW the adhidevata of Kuja Graha or Planet Mars is Kartikeya. One Navagraha Stotram describes Kuja (Sevvai) as “Kumaram Shaktihastam”. This makes one think that it is planet Mars which is worshipped as Kartikeya.

This comment might be very late… but documenting whatever I could analyse regarding birth of Murugan and Pillayar.
Murugan is created by Shiva, completed by Parvathi… while Pillayar is created by parvathi and completed by Shiva.

The concept of Vikku is very clear………. Palaniappan Vairum stick in one point without clear evidence…… also in little confusion…..

As vikku said you must think about “When you blog please use history, science and etymology and archeological, geographical concepts, interpretations and explanations.”

Pls. mainly concentrate on updates of Archeological evidence. Just try to know about recent archeological research in Aditchanallur…. you will get more info. Indian govt. is very careful in hide the truth from world…….

Why is it that every discussion should have a few worthies passing extremely rude comments on brahmins? Is it because of their numerical inferiority? It is well known that the power and land ownership lies with the so called mbc etc. who enjoy extensive quotas.the dalits, who have been persecuted are still the same lot. Shame on you zealots, people like u.v. Swaminathan have done much more that pseudo tamils from adjoining states, who write 3rd poems, movies and other fakes who call tamil a barbaric language.
Apologies being off topic, but these worms come out of the woodwork, bloated from freebies given by third rate government.

To get into this topic, we must understand the truth of modern worship and the origin of the said God. We have similar trails in the concept of Lord Vishu & Lord Thirumal(Mayon). If anyone could say that Vaishnavam and its source god Vishnu is originated from Northern India, I would object as Thirumal is the god of Mullai landscape. The concept of integration with Mayon – Thirumal – Perumal – Vishu happened in Murugan – Karthikeyan – Kanthan – kumaraswamy and so on.

Worst Analysis about Murugan Kadavul… Read kanda Puranam which is the largest and biggest form of 108 puranas. Murugan is the finest name which means beauty in Tamil.. Try to feel him inside you rather reading scripts and books then you will understand the mistake of the north Indian idiots and Aryans who spoiled the culture.

This is my analysis based on Siddhartham ( sitthars). Every object has it’s place and time. Therefore who is Murugan is it an object (active) or subject ( passive)? First we need to find the property of Murugan ( Word). Murugan also called Sayon. This property concise of place ( idam) time ( kalam) for any occasions, occurrence and understanding. From my research everyone need space and time for everything even being within oneself. So how Murugan ( sayon) be noun ed in 300BCE. ” Vallalar Agaval’s” – in Tamil = Oru Katilley one Nilam, Antha nilathil oru Deivam( Mayon) Trimala(Tirumalai). Antha Deivathai angu koduvanthanvan payirseythavan Sayon ( Murugan).

There is a basic flaw in this whole analysis Mr.Vairam, you are pointing out references in words saying that kanda, subramaniyam or saravana belong to sanskrit. you are assuming that sanskrit existed before tamil and tamil is an offshoot of sanskrit.. why cant the reverse happen … the existing tamil language is a revived version of older tamil that belonged to kumari kandam… My justification for saying sanskrit borrowed words from tamil is that Tamil language and its people saw one of the disasters like the end of this world (flood of lemuria).. and our oldest known literatures like agattiyam are completely lost… Why cant it be like what our literature says.. lord muruga taught tamil to our people and sanskrit became an offshoot of tamil.. For your reference there is no proof that sanskrit language existed before lemuria flood.. and lemuria flood is recorded 50000bc and there is no sanskrit literature written before 3rd or 5thce… And again for your reference tamil people have kula deivam… it means they cannot change their kula deivam as they like… most tamils have muruga as their kula deivam… since there is no change in kula deivam.. lord muruga is a tamil kadavul as long as tamil people existed… PLEASE DONT READ FOREIGN AUTHOR BOOKS ON TAMIL AND SANSKRIT AND ASSUME EVERYTHING.. I AM GIVING YOU MATERIALISTIC EVIDENCE ON EXISTENCE OF TAMIL COMMUNITY BEFORE HARRAPAN OR INDUS VALLEY.. THE BOOKS YOU’VE READ ARE INCOMPLETE… PLEASE RELATE THE INFO GIVEN IN BOOKS AND TRY TO MATCH IT WITH LOCAL TALES AND SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE….

if The six faces murgan represent the following:
(i) Five, one element each: Ether, air, fire, water and earth. The sixth face represents the Spirit that bestows LIFE to the beings formed by the five elements.

was the concept of mahabharta ‘ pandwas and different packets and groups of pandavas .
if is true the ,then what would had been the big conspirances to kill the peoples .﻿

First let us get out of superstition and understand there is God and son for him worshipped as muruga,vinayaga,manna,ayyappa and esappa. But if we get out of religion v WL b saved from confusion. V r doing this in a village and succeeding. CTC 08056183186 or email exim_experts@yahoo.com

Alexander was the first great emperor Indians have encountered. He was called by Indians as Sikander, an uncanny resemblence to the name Skanda. The most famous weapon of Greeks to which Alexander belonged is Lance, in tamil we call it Vel. ChandraGupta Maurya and other elites of India who encountered Alexander were so admired that they deitifed him, built temples, mythologies and traditions after him and called him as Skanda. Mauryans were a tribe or a community who had Peacock as their state symbol. In fact the name Maurya itself a derived form of Mayura meaning Peacock. Hence their God Skanda naturally had mount as Peacock. All these happened around 300 BC.

All Sangam literature were started around this period and ended in 300 AD. There is a 600 year duration during which North Indian Skanda tradition could have likely leaked into South India. There could have been a native Murugan God but his symbols of Vel, color Red, Peacock and War like nature were actually personification of north Indian Skanda A.K.A Alexander

Fun fact, not just Indians many other similar cultures around the world who encountered Alexanders bravery deitified him. Alexander himself uplifted his status as a demi-God during his rule in Persia. However only Tamils follow him as God today and others have simply forgotton.